Twenty plus years ago when I worked for a large hospital organization, one of my first tasks was to shadow a variety of doctors to develop ways to make their time more efficient (basically, how can they see their patients quickly and get back to their offices). One of the physicians I followed for several days was a cardiologist.

As we were chatting one morning, he spoke about healthcare in Sweden. His example - a woman discovers a lump on her breast - cancerous? She goes to a healthcare facility there and she goes through a series of tests and has an answer rather quickly. Her anxiety may be gone; her treatment options explained. He asked, “Why cannot the US be like that?”

That was in 2000. Contrast your own healthcare experience in the US. Continuing the above example…a woman discovers a lump on her breast, then waits to make an appointment to get a mammography. Whatever time that takes makes for some anxious moments. Mammography complete, now time to get the results - when can the doctor see them and discuss? This week? Next week? Maybe a biopsy is scheduled then. Another set of days before that is done; another set of days before the results are known.

That may be an oversimplification of the process but the point is why is so much time wasted in diagnosing a patient and coming up with a course of action in the US? There may be some hospitals like Mayo where the speed from discovery to treatment is much shorter but that is likely not the norm.

If you arrive at an ER, yes, lots of tests are run rather quickly. If I want to make an appointment with that same cardiologist (we became friends), it may be weeks before I can get in. Someone I know tried to make an appointment for a neurologist - he can see you in two months - and this was for a post-stroke patient.

In Lean, we talk about eliminating waste. One area is waiting time. One area to improve healthcare quality is determine ways to reduce the angst of waiting for test results. Thank God for myChart or other electronic record systems. I can get a blood test today and look at my results tomorrow, likely before my doctor has even bothered to. I am smart enough to read whether an item is within normal range or not. While I may not develop on my own a course of action, the one thing it does do is take away some of the uncertainty.

For those of you still in the healthcare field, if you can find ways to streamline healthcare delivery, you will be miracle workers. :)